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Politics 2023 (Read 465817 times)

TobyD

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Politics 2023
January 03, 2020, 07:51:10 am
It seems somewhat odd that Dominic Cummings in his blog criticised the civil service for too many public school bluffers and Oxbridge humanities graduates; does he not realise he could be referring to most of the current cabinet,  most of all, his boss?
« Last Edit: January 20, 2023, 08:26:37 pm by duncan »

TobyD

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#1 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 07:36:28 am
Interested to know what the Labour members on here make of the candidates for leadership,  who's got the best chance of leading them back to some semblance of electability?

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#2 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 09:06:14 am
Interested to know what the Labour members on here make of the candidates for leadership,  who's got the best chance of leading them back to some semblance of electability?

I'll bite :)

This is a brain dump of a response so quite raw but...

Very early days - and I've not heard many of them talk yet. Starmer is clearly a front runner - and I think would perform very well in PMQ's etc... I like him. But - not sure he's different enough (white late middle aged male) - and there are some good alternatives. RLB comes across well - but her tag of the 'continuity candidate' doesnt chime well with me. I heard Lisa Nandy on the radio on Sunday and she came across very very well to me...

I really don't want a shouty man adressing a rally type leader. We have a posh shouty man as PM.

Note - theres nothing in my response about policies  - to me its its more about character and that they are not factional like JC was.

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#3 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 01:01:51 pm
Quote
Note - theres nothing in my response about policies  - to me its its more about character and that they are not factional like JC was.

How does that fit with R Long-Bailey? Much the same, but with more subtlety, surely?

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#4 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 01:50:50 pm
Quote
Note - theres nothing in my response about policies  - to me its its more about character and that they are not factional like JC was.

How does that fit with R Long-Bailey? Much the same, but with more subtlety, surely?

Yeah, from what I've heard/read thats correct about what I think. A younger, female, better communicating JC. She's not one I would vote for.
Lewis, Thornberry are both non-starters IMHO..

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#5 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 02:57:24 pm
Am not a member of Labour but did vote for them and have considered being a member.

Personally it’s a bit too early to tell who is best. Although I agree that Starmer would likely do well with PMQs and being interviewed on Radio4 etc. I think this is an important component of being a political leader these days.

Generally I would like someone with similar policies (but possibly slightly less left wing eg a bit less nationalisation - am thinking of the 2017 manifesto) but with no baggage and better at communicating with the media etc


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#6 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 03:46:11 pm
I think Long-Bailey has blown it a bit leaving it so late to set out her stall. Starmer in particular has stolen a march on her.

A few weeks ago my choice would have been Thornberry but I am leaning towards Starmer. It isn't a great look voting for the only man with a realistic chance of winning the leadership but I wouldn't be in favour of Long-Bailey as I don't think shes experienced enough or has properly considered the result of the election. I think Phillips will gain ground but I can't stand her; all self promotion and slagging off the leadership over the last few years. By contrast the Tories kept their traps largely shut and that kind of unity really helps I think.

So as it stands I would vote for Starmer I think. I take TT's point about him being a metro white male but I can see him going down well with Middle England (being a sir always helps...) and on the Today programme as previously mentioned. Rayner would definitely be my pick as Deputy, I think shes streets ahead of Long Bailey and a large part of me thinks she should be running for the top job.

TobyD

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#7 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 04:26:13 pm
Interesting replies, I feel that if RLB is picked, they've as good as lost the next election based on her adherence to the Corbyn line, and not even addressing anti-Semitism. I like Jess Phillips, but I think she's probably too honest and not quite suited to leadership, at least yet. Starmer and Thornberry  are the most experienced and professional politicians, but I fear that many of the electorate might not vote for them.

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#8 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 04:35:17 pm
Perhaps worth thinking about who didn’t vote for Labour? Where it was personality rather than policy, I think  Starmer is miles in front appealing to middle England and those who simply wanted to have confidence in the leadership.

TobyD

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#9 Re: Politics 2020
January 07, 2020, 08:25:29 pm
Perhaps worth thinking about who didn’t vote for Labour? Where it was personality rather than policy, I think  Starmer is miles in front appealing to middle England and those who simply wanted to have confidence in the leadership.

I'd probably agree,  in that he has more widespread appeal  than Thornberry. Sort of a shame as she always sounds  very well up on her brief, is good at the dispatch box, she'd probably be a very good leader but I fear she would have little chance of getting there.

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#10 Re: Politics 2020
January 08, 2020, 10:59:11 pm
Today's PMQs was perhaps the first time I've heard Corbyn ask some pertinent questions and not just read out letters about buses or something. He's probably relieved that noone expects him to talk about brexit anymore. BJ didn't seem to have an answer for whether killing foreign leaders in a sovereign country might have contravened international law, or whether he'd withdraw UK troops from Iraq if the Iraqi government asked him to.

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#11 Re: Politics 2020
January 09, 2020, 09:55:30 am
BJ didn't seem to have an answer for whether killing foreign leaders in a sovereign country might have contravened international law, or whether he'd withdraw UK troops from Iraq if the Iraqi government asked him to.

I expect this is something we’ll have to get used to over the next 12 weeks. He’s rarely, if ever, engaged properly with any serious line of questioning and yesterday’s PMQs was no different. Hopefully this will change with a new opposition leader but I’m not holding my breath.

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#12 Re: Politics 2020
January 09, 2020, 10:41:07 am
It's because he doesn't have a clue. Not like he has had a job as Foreign Secretary or anything in the past where he may have had experience of dealing with things like this..

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#13 Re: Politics 2020
January 09, 2020, 10:48:55 am
Yes, I probably should have said I hope he’s forced to engage by a new opposition leader (a more forensic one). And also that he might one day turn up to a select committee hearing.

TobyD

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#14 Re: Politics 2020
January 09, 2020, 10:53:44 am
BJ didn't seem to have an answer for whether killing foreign leaders in a sovereign country might have contravened international law, or whether he'd withdraw UK troops from Iraq if the Iraqi government asked him to.

I expect this is something we’ll have to get used to over the next 12 weeks. He’s rarely, if ever, engaged properly with any serious line of questioning and yesterday’s PMQs was no different. Hopefully this will change with a new opposition leader but I’m not holding my breath.

Yes, I'd agree,  my biggest concern about this government is their diligence in trying to avoid any scrutiny whatsoever,  from boycotting Today,  delaying the appointment of select committees, changing the lobby reporting system, avoiding PMQs... Added to the fact that Cummings wants to appoint lots of mavericks, all of whom agree with him, and neuter the civil service.

 
It's because he doesn't have a clue. Not like he has had a job as Foreign Secretary or anything in the past where he may have had experience of dealing with things like this..

I'm not sure if he doesn't know or doesn't care. I think the latter is more likely.  I don't think BJ is a fool, but I do suspect he is already mainly concerned with hanging onto his majority,  and knows that most people don't really know or much care about foreign policy.  Not a fool, but he comes across as a cynical and rather unpleasant person. 

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#15 Re: Politics 2020
January 10, 2020, 12:01:40 pm
I'm not a Labour member and it doesn't look like he has much of a chance, but Clive Lewis has been speaking a lot of sense about electoral reform and PR.

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#16 Re: Politics 2020
January 10, 2020, 12:25:07 pm
Electoral Reform won't happen while those who decide on it benefit from it.

Nick Clegg sold his soul to gamble all on it, and lost. Can't see it changing any time soon.

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#17 Re: Politics 2020
January 10, 2020, 02:18:25 pm
Funnily enough, Labour pretty much are proportionally represented based on their results in the election: 32.2% of the vote, 31% of the MPs. PR being a Labour policy though would be make it a much more likely proposition than being just a Lib Dem/Green policy. I agree that it's unlikely to happen soon, but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't.

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#18 Re: Politics 2020
January 10, 2020, 03:24:21 pm
Electoral Reform won't happen while those who decide on it benefit from it.

Agreed. But I don't think Labour benefit from it any more. With the changed political landscape in Scotland and the latest constituency boundary changes, FPTP only serves one party and that is the Conservatives. It doesn't even serve the SNP; there is no point having a disproportionate number of MPs in a system that delivers a sweeping majority to another party ensuring that all of your MPs can be ignored.

I don't expect there to be any shift in Labour policy on electoral reform because I think many of them have their heads in the sand regarding how bleak their electoral prospects are.

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#19 Re: Politics 2020
January 10, 2020, 10:33:27 pm
I don't expect there to be any shift in Labour policy on electoral reform because I think many of them have their heads in the sand regarding how bleak their electoral prospects are.

Perhaps, but many don't. I'm not a particular fan of hers but Lisa Nandy had explicitly said that the party needs to change in a massive way or it will die.  I think Jess Phillips has said similar things.
RLB saying she'd give Corbyn 10/10 for leadership is ridiculous.

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#20 Re: Politics 2020
January 11, 2020, 01:28:16 pm
It might be ridiculous but it's probably genuine.  The left of Labour seems blind to the problem. Corbyn could have been a reforming and successful leader if he had  been more honest about his relative political position in the party and sacrificed some movement of the party to the left for keeping the party unified and pragmatic (especially in its attraction to swing voters).  Unfortunately that wasn't in him. In particular, an overcomplicated unrealistic looking manifesto, telling ex Labour swing voters what they needed, when those voters thought very differently, wasn't ever going to end well. In effect Labour had abandoned the northern working class swing vote and too many of the progressive voting UK majority distrusted JC so much (and thought so little about the worse alternative)  that by not voting tactically they gifted Boris his big majority.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_United_Kingdom_general_election

The 2017 results, despite the tory landslide victory, really do show a progressive majority......non progressives were: 43.6 % voting conservative, 2% Brexit and 1.3 % others....on the progressive side: Labour (32.2) plus Lib Dem (11.6) plus SNP (3.9) plus Green (2.7) was 51.4%, with 1.7% other progressives. The exit polls also show a demographic in youth and education levels support for progressive agendas that is good news for the future of progressive parties (unless you believe the bs that well educated young progressives mostly become right wing when they get old).  When Maggie won her second term, political pundits were saying Labour could never win a majority in England again; and then came the hubris, scandals and Blair. This current tory Parliamentary party looks to me to be the most right wing and craven ever, way more so than under Maggie when the 'wets' still had significant power.  All the new tory PMs this century have said they will support the common people and yet distribution of wealth and fairness of treatment for the poorer in society just gets worse and worse. Boris is a contender for the biggest liar ever in the history of the PM role and his lies will come back to harm him, as in any hard brexit people will suffer when the economy takes a hit (and even if his latest 'one nation' spin turns out to be real: for a soft brexit we are marginally poorer rule followers with no place at the rule making table); also after 10 years of tory governments much of the public sector is on its knees and requires more money than he has available.

Hence, after some hard times,  there is plenty of hope for the future of Labour, especially if it can rediscover some of the centre left attraction it had until a decade ago.

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#21 Re: Politics 2020
January 11, 2020, 01:44:04 pm
It might be ridiculous but it's probably genuine.  The left of Labour seems blind to the problem...

Hence, after some hard times,  there is plenty of hope for the future of Labour, especially if it can rediscover some of the centre left attraction it had until a decade ago.

If they can leave the intensely factional hard left very much on the periphery. Recent reports that McDonnell and Abbot are supporting Burgon for deputy are concerning; Angela Rayner is clearly far more capable and media friendly. Richard Burgon always sounds as though he's ranting from a rather uninformed perspective.
I really hope they can sort themselves out at least to present a credible opposition for a start. I think that references to 2017 as any kind of success are denying the basic reality that Labour still lost, to an absolutely appalling car crash of a conservative campaign and a deeply unpopular leader.

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#22 Re: Politics 2020
January 11, 2020, 02:28:21 pm
Burgon on the prospect of a 2019 election and Labour's 'success' in 2017:
https://youtu.be/9MHNbwE2Sb0?t=90

KB: The polls say you won't win
RB : The polls said we wouldn't win last time
KB: You didn't
« Last Edit: January 11, 2020, 02:34:22 pm by mrjonathanr »

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#23 Re: Politics 2020
January 11, 2020, 02:45:59 pm
If the hard left keep retaining power in Labour, I just think it means another party will fill the gap.  The tory party have destroyed their breadth of appeal by claiming an impossible unicorn brexit and making rash promises and in doing so expelled the best in their parliamentary party. Progressive numbers in the population look to grow and at some point enough of those well educated middle class progressive voters (currently too often blaming and insulting northern working class voters for voting tory), will get their act together and vote tactically properly. I'm particularly gutted for Vernon Coaker, a sensible Labour moderate who lost his seat by less than 700 votes due to more than 3000 voters voting Lib Dem and Green in my next door constituency, Gedling.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gedling_(UK_Parliament_constituency)

Apologies as my eyesight let me down typing in the numbers on the calculation above... progressive voters are the same total but the 2019 sum for the 4 main progressive partys adds up to just over half ( 50.4%).

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#24 Re: Politics 2020
January 11, 2020, 04:04:16 pm
Burgon on the prospect of a 2019 election and Labour's 'success' in 2017:
https://youtu.be/9MHNbwE2Sb0?t=90

KB: The polls say you won't win
RB : The polls said we wouldn't win last time
KB: You didn't

I watched the video there and this came up in the suggestions afterwards. A bit more politics 2015 than 2020, but it was refreshing to see two people with very different views being civil and nice to each other.


 

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